Railing Against the Prophetic Again
March 11th, 2008 by Carl Thomas.One of my disciples asked me the other day about a “national prophet” that had given a specific prophecy regarding a rapper that did not come to pass. He questioned how this national prophet could have been so wrong.
I restated the question asking how people who are wrong so often are regarded as national prophets. The prophetic ministry in America has a serious lack of oversight and accountability. I have remarked in the past about the abundance of homosexual sin in the prophetic movement and I truly believe there is a link here.
I personally know less than a handful of people that I would consider prophets. I see lots of people who consider themselves prophets but I think the fruit does not bear witness. If we are going to be a New Testament church, we have to use the New Testament as the measuring stick.
Paul wrote in his letter to the Ephesians that the five-fold ministry was for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry. For too long we call people who prophesy real good prophets. I do not believe that is the case. You can have a deep and strong gift of prophecy without being in the office of prophet. And just because you can’t tell who is calling without looking at the caller id and you don’t see the voice of the Lord in ever headline out of Jerusalem does not mean you are not a prophet.
I take the call of the prophet to come from Jeremiah 1:10
See, I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms,
to pluck up and to break down,
to destroy and to overthrow,
to build and to plant.”
And I think that this is the test of a prophetic ministry. IT would seem that the test of a prophetic ministry these days lies in the ability to tell the head of a church you are visiting how much God favors your church over the one down the street and how special that pastor is.
Do prophets prophecy? Of course they do. Does a person in the office of prophet get it wrong now and then? Of course they do. Not every pastor give the perfect counsel every time. Sometimes the evangelist gets it wrong when witnessing. Sometimes the teacher doesn’t fully understand a scripture.
But the pastor is held accountable for bad counsel. The teacher is held accountable for false teaching. The evangelist is held accountable for bad doctrine. So too the church must not be so enamored with the prophetic to keep from demanding accountability for those who minister the “Word of the Lord.”
Prophets, by the nature of their call, should be more open to confrontational accountability and should demand more from the Church then we are seeing.
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>>the ability to tell the head of a church you are visiting how much God favors your church over the one down the street and how special that pastor is.<<
First thing that jumped into my mind was the recurrent theme in Jeremiah about the “prophets” prophesying lies… pleasant things that tickled their ears… and this verse:
“yet they prophesy a lie in My name, that I may drive you out, and that you may perish, you and the prophets who prophesy to you.” (Jer. 27:15)
Ouch.
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I understand we know in part and prophesy in part!
but the part you do know , your gonna get it wrong?
ha ha , come to The Mission, We can help you!
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Carl,
Prophesying and the “office” of prophet will always be amiss and out of synch as long as we erroneously see its anointing primarily as one of foretelling. I just don’t see that, particularly from a NT perspective. Biblical prophets and prophesying are about inspired speech not prognostication, forthtelling rather than foretelling. Prophets speak for strengthening, encouragement and comfort, not speculation.
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@Kathi – ouch indeed
@Ley – exactly. I think much of this problem is that many would fail to admit that they do not know it all.
@slw – I agree completely. The prophetic is not palm reading, fortune telling, tea leaf reading or any other witchcraft inspired nonsense. some prophetic “instruction manuals”, claim to be so all encompassing that you no longer need the Holy Ghost to function. Dream interpretation is by far the greatest abused in this area.
My greatest pain comes from the fact that the Church does place a greater, more biblical demand on the prophetic ministry.
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But SLW, my goodness, what WILL the church do if prophets don’t tell us the future?
Rely on God? Put our trust in Him?
double-ouch.
(sorry for the sarcasm, but I too am a bit frustrated with some of what’s called “prophetic” out there.)
As an aside, I looked through one of those “dream interpretation manuals” one day. As a former occultist, I was a bit shocked to see that these manuals are just glossed over versions of Buckland’s stuff (Buckland = prolific pagan author).
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I think the prophetic ministry is difficult work and is a dangerous work. To stand and deliver a word from the Lord, in the office of a prhophet, is a dangerous thing not to be taken too lightly. I personally believe that if a prophet can’t, won’t or doesn’t pray over much of what they prophesy, they aren’t much of a prophet. In fact, I wonder how many prophets would dry up if all they could do was pray in what God was speaking to them. Just a thought.
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